But while he was in the full flush of self-congratulation at the degree in which, as he flattered himself, he had contributed to the downfall of England, the exuberance of his spirits prompted him to try his hand at a fourth play, a sort of sequel to one of his earlier performances—­“The Barber of Seville.”  He finished it about the end of the year 1781, and, as the manager of the theatre was willing to act it, he at once applied for the necessary license.  But it had already been talked about:  if one party had pronounced it lively, witty, and the cleverest play that had been seen since the death of Moliere, another set of readers declared it full of immoral and dangerous satire on the institutions of the country.  It is almost inseparable from the very nature of comedy that it should be to some extent satirical.  The offense which those who complained of “The Marriage of Figaro” on that account really found in it was, that it satirized classes and institutions which could not bear such attacks, and had not been used to them.  Moliere had ridiculed the lower middle class; the newly rich; the tradesman who, because he had made a fortune, thought himself a gentleman; but, as one whose father was in the employ of royalty, he laid no hand on any pillar of the throne.  But Beaumarchais, in “The Marriage of Figaro,” singled out especially what were called the privileged classes; he attacked the licentiousness of the nobles; the pretentious imbecility of ministers and diplomatists; the cruel injustice of wanton arrests and imprisonments of protracted severity against which there was no appeal nor remedy; and the privileged classes in consequence denounced his work, and their complaints of its character and tendency made such an impression that the court resolved that the license should not he granted.

The refusal, however, was not at first pronounced in a straightforward way; but was deferred, as if those who had resolved on it feared to pronounce it.  For a long time the censor gave no reply at all, till Beaumarchais complained of the delay as more injurious to him than a direct denial.  When at last his application was formally rejected, he induced his friends to raise such a clamor in his favor, that Louis determined to judge for himself, and caused Madame de Campan to read it to himself and the queen.  He fully agreed with the censor.  Many passages he pronounced to be in extremely bad taste.  When the reader came to the allusions to secret arrests, protracted imprisonments, and the tedious formalities of the law and lawyers, he declared that it would be necessary to pull down the Bastile before it could be acted with safety, as Beaumarchais was ridiculing every thing which ought to be respected.  “It is not to be performed, then?” said the queen.  “No,” replied the king, “you may depend upon that.”